Goodness Gracious: Mad Magazine Hits The Nail On The Head ...!

Peggy Noonan: A Tragedy Of Errors, And An Accounting

Until this column, Peggy Noonan and I were not in charity; she, a self-professed Catholic and conservative, was worshipping at the Altar of Zero. This is the first column in a long time where she has pulled her tongue off 0bama's boots and turned slightly away from the Altar, and back towards reality.

Now, she's no longer a fave read, but she has redeemed herself, a bit. Maybe the scales are falling from her eyes. And, of course, she says good things about the Marines, and I adore the Marines.

Yayy, Peggy.

=================================================================================================

It is late in the morning one day last December.

A plane is in distress, it's lost one engine and now two and it's going down, and people on the ground hear the sound, look up, say, "That's going awful low," and whip out their cellphones. You could see the pictures they took later on the news.

It sounds like Chesley Sullenburger and US Airways Flight 1549, but that was five weeks later. This was the military jet that went down in San Diego; this was the story that ended badly.

Then this week it took a turn. And looked at a certain way, the San Diego story is every bit as big, and elements of it just as deserving of emulation, as Sully saving all souls when he put down in the Hudson.

It's Dec. 8, 2008, 11:11 a.m., and a young Marine pilot takes off from an aircraft carrier, the USS Abraham Lincoln, on a routine training flight. The carrier is maybe 90 miles southwest of San Diego. Lt. Dan Neubauer is flying an F/A-18 Hornet. Minutes into the flight, he notices low oil pressure in one of the two engines. He shuts it down. Then the light shows low fuel for the other engine. He's talking to air traffic control and given options and suggestions on where to make an emergency landing. He can go to the naval air station at North Island, the route to which takes him over San Diego Bay, or he can go to the Marine air station at Miramar, with which he is more familiar, but which takes him over heavily populated land. He goes for Miramar. The second engine flames out. About three miles from the runway, the electrical system dies. Lt. Neubauer tries to aim the jet toward a canyon, and ejects at what all seem to agree is the last possible moment.

AP

Dong Yun Yoon arrives with his minister the Rev. Daniel Shin at the crash site where his wife, two daughters and mother-in-law were killed.

The jet crashed nose down in the University City neighborhood of San Diego, hitting two homes and damaging three. Four people, all members of a Korean immigrant family, were killed—36-year-old Youngmi Lee; her daughters, Grace, 15 months, and Rachel, 2 months, and her 60-year-old mother, Seokim Kim.

Lee's husband, a grocer named Dong Yun Yoon, was at work. The day after he'd lost his family, he humbled and awed San Diego by publicly forgiving the pilot—"I know he did everything he could"—and speaking of his faith—"I know God is taking care of my family."

His grace and generosity were staggering, but there was growing local anger at the military. Why was the disabled plane over land? The Marines launched an investigation—of themselves. This Wednesday the results were announced.

They could not have been tougher, or more damning. The crash, said Maj. Gen. Randolph Alles, the assistant wing commander for the Third Marine Aircraft Wing, was "clearly avoidable," the result of "a chain of wrong decisions." Mechanics had known since July of a glitch in the jet's fuel-transfer system; the Hornet should have been removed from service and fixed, and was not. The young pilot failed to read the safety checklist. He relied on guidance from Marines at Miramar who did not have complete knowledge or understanding of his situation. He should have been ordered to land at North Island. He took an unusual approach to Miramar, taking a long left loop instead of a shorter turn to the right, which ate up time and fuel.

Twelve Marines were disciplined; four senior officers, including the squadron commander, were removed from duty. Their military careers are, essentially, over. The pilot is grounded while a board reviews his future.

Residents told the San Diego Union-Tribune that they were taken aback by the report. Bob Johnson, who lived behind the Yoons and barely escaped the crash, said, "The Marines aren't trying to hide from it or duck it. They took it on the chin." A retired Navy pilot who lives less than a block from the crash and had formed, with neighbors, a group to push the Marines for an investigation, and for limiting flights over University City, said after the briefing, "I think we're out of business." In a later story the paper quoted a retired general, Bob Butcher, chairman of a society of former Marine aviators, calling the report "as open and frank a discussion of an accident as I've seen." "It was a lot more candid than many people expected."

This wasn't damage control, it was taking honest responsibility. And as such, in any modern American institution, it was stunning.

The day after the report I heard from a young Naval aviator in predeployment training north of San Diego. He flies a Super Hornet, sister ship to the plane that went down. He said the Marine investigation "kept me up last night" because of how it contrasted with "the buck-passing we see" in the government and on Wall Street. He and his squadron was in range of San Diego television stations when they carried the report's conclusions live. He'd never seen "our entire wardroom crowded around a television" before. They watched "with bated breath." At the end they were impressed with the public nature of the criticism, and its candor: "There are still elements within the government that take personal responsibility seriously." He found himself wondering if the Marines had been "too hard on themselves." "But they are, after all, Marines."

By contrast, he says, when the economy came crashing down, "nowhere did we see a board come out and say: 'This is what happened, these are the decisions these particular people made, and this was the result. They are no longer a part of our organization.' There was no timeline of events or laymen's explanation of how a credit derivative was actually derived. We did not see congressmen get on television with charts and eviscerate their organization and say, 'These were the men who in 2003 allowed Freddie and Fannie unlimited rein over mortgage securities.' Instead we saw . . . everybody against everybody else with no one stepping forth and saying, 'We screwed up…'" There is no one in national leadership who could convincingly "assign blame," and no one "who could or would accept it."

This of course is true, but somehow more stinging when said by a serviceman.

The White House this week was consumed by extreme interest in a celebrated radio critic, reportedly coordinating an attack line with antic Clinton-era political operatives who don't know what time it is. For them it's always the bouncy '90s and anything goes, it's all just a game. President Obama himself contributes to an atmosphere of fear grown to panic as he takes a historic crisis and turns it into what he imagines is a grand opportunity for sweeping change. What we need is stabilization—an undergirding, a restrengthening so things can settle and then rise. What we're given is multiple schemes, and the beginning of a reordering of financial realities between the individual and the state.

The Obama people think they are playing big ball, not small ball, and they no doubt like the feeling of it: "We're making history." But that, ironically, was precisely the preoccupation of the last administration—doing it big, being "consequential," showing history. Watch: Within six months, the Obama administration will be starting to breathe the word "legacy."

What they're up to will win and hold support, at least for a while, until the reaction.

But is it responsible? Or is it only vain?

Anyway, all honor this week to the Marines, who were very much the former, not the latter.

Compare And Contrast: GWB and BH0 Vis-a-Vis The Marines

Most Marines are savvy enough to know who's on their side and who isn't.

It is my belief that Barack feels inferior to members of the military --- and rightly so.  The feeling makes him defensive, which, in turn, causes him to hold himself aloof. 

Please note, it's all about feelings.  Acting based solely on feelings is the hallmark of the liberal.

Different Presidents, A Different Marine Corps: Obama Vs Bush

'Nuff said.

Goodness Gracious: Gotta Keep Politics Away From The Beauty Shop ...

I kinda got into it with my beautician --- and friend --- and one of the customers at the beauty shop today.  I called 0bama the "0bamessiah," reminded them of his drug addiction (they were dissing Bush's addiction), and so on.  We even got into the chimp cartoom thing.

My friend didn't say anything, but after I left, I realized I said things that didn't necessarily need to be said.

From now on, I'll stick with Michelle's clothes ...

Free-Floating Anger

A few years ago, the movie The Core showed static electricity building up and discharging, suddenly, unpredictably, and with horrific consequences, at in electrical superstorms at random sites all over the world. These devastating electrical storms destroyed the Roman Colosseum and San Francisco.

I feel the static emotional electricity building as I type.

It's not a good or a comfortable feeling.

People are mad as hell about the actions of government in the last month, and all that anger is floating above our heads, a malevolent cloud seeking a path --- any path --- to ground.

The Octo-Mom is attracting some of the energy --- the violent and sickly imaginative death threats she and everyone around her have received are above and beyond any rational reaction to her admittedly execrable behavior.

With any luck, some of the destructive potential of this anger will be leached off by Tea Parties --- but I think the Tea Parties will just crank up the anger, especially as people realize the drive-by media have no intention of covering these righteous demonstrations, preferring bobbing around in 0bama's tank and hoping, like the faithful puppy under the family dinner table, that a few pieces of Our Dear Leader's wagyu steak will drop on the floor within their reach.

I'm afraid it's going to get very very bad out there, long before it gets better ...

The Acronym FUBO ...

has gone viral in the conservative pathways of the Internet.

Does this make me racist?

Hmmm ...

Speculation: Obama's First Hundred Days

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2191215/posts

The phrase “a hundred days” was coined by the Compte de Chabrol in 1815, referring to the time between Napoleon’s escape from Elba, and his defeat. Later, it was used to describe the 3-month honeymoon FDR enjoyed in 1933 with Congress, essentially dictating legislation from the Oval Office. Now, for better or for worse, we grade all of our Presidents on their First Hundred Days.

A lot can happen in a hundred days. Empires can be made and lost. It’s worth taking an early look at Obama’s first month to see what the first hundred could bring, even if the trends may be skewed by the learning-curve a one-term Senator might inevitably face in his new job:

- Joe Biden told the Russians we want to “hit the reset button” with them – ignoring a number of recent provocations on their part.

- Hillary Clinton tried showing off her intelligence – literally – by using sensitive information about North Korea as talking points during her current “listening tour” overseas.

- Secretary Gates and Ambassador Holbrooke publicly contradicted each other on what a rapprochement with the Taliban might mean for Pakistan and Afghanistan.

- Obama outsourced the rushed creation of a massive bill to his Party apparatchiks, and got handed a partisan and flawed result, whose final outcome depended on preserving the vote of a badly compromised Roland Burris, and hip-checking Judd Gregg with a Mephistophelian offer of a Cabinet position. In the meantime, the President’s campaign has failed to pay its debts.

- The Attorney General called Americans “cowards” for not addressing issues of race.

- The new Secretary of the Treasury got the Stock Market to plunge by revealing a mortgage bailout plan remarkable only for it’s lack of vision, theme, and details – which seems all too much a reflection of his own tax returns.

- The new Secretary of Transportation suggested a tax on the number of miles driven by car-owners, which the White House almost immediately repudiated.

- Numerous Democrat legislators warned darkly of resurrecting the Fairness Doctrine, which the President declined to support.

To any observer trying to decipher where this Administration is attempting to go, there’s no wonder that the only impression is incoherence and contradiction. Biden and Clinton seem intent on proving to our allies and adversaries that President Obama is not President Bush – but neither of them can say what that means. In the meantime, the Iranians are launching space vehicles, and building nukes. The Russians are flexing their muscle everywhere, and the Taliban is emerging from their caves.

At home, the only industry likely to be stimulated by the recent porkfest will be the lawyers who will file countless suits over whether the Federal government can force States to take money they don’t want, or whether a handwritten insert from a staffer or lobbyist truly constitutes “the intent of Congress” in the making of law.

Al Sharpton and North Carolina’s James Clyborn found new ways to feign outrage – Sharpton alleging a racial slur to the President as the writer of a bill with which he had almost nothing to do, and Clyborn alleging that refusing federal money (and the strings attached) was tantamount to racism. No wonder people are afraid to talk about race when even non-racial issues can turn up “the race card.”

Emboldened by the bailout of bad loans made by bad banks to bad credit risks, groups like ACORN are breaking into foreclosed homes and declaring squatter’s rights. The Stock Market continues to fall. What’s a leader to do?

Predictably, the President has embarked on the one thing he does best – hitting the road, shaking hands, and making promises. In short: he’s campaigning again, but this time Americans are asking for something more than vague promises of “change.” Several appearances have been annoyingly marred by dissent.

Karl Rove comments that, for as disciplined as the Obama campaign may have been in the past, his team is “winging it” on most issues now. In fact, nothing has really changed: no amount of discipline can offset the lack of a substantive message.

The time for campaign rhetoric is past, and the consequences of this lack of discipline and substance keep piling up. A lot can happen in a hundred days. Here’s hoping our President can figure out how to avoid marching all of us to Waterloo before the time is up.

Where Is The Outrage? Part The First

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5ihA0Z5ybW84SLeY3NQbodRanP0mwD96EH44G3

By BEN EVANS – 23 hours ago

WASHINGTON (AP) — The economic stimulus signed by President Barack Obama will spread billions of dollars across the country to spruce up aging roads and bridges. But there's not a dime specifically dedicated to fixing leftover damage from Hurricane Katrina.

And there's no outrage about it.

Democrats who routinely criticized President George W. Bush for not sending more money to the Gulf Coast appear to be giving Obama the benefit of the doubt in his first major spending initiative. Even the Gulf's fiercest advocates say they're happy with the stimulus package, and their states have enough money for now to address their needs.

"I'm not saying there won't be a need in the future, but right now the focus is not on more money, it's on using what we have," said Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., who has criticized Democrats and Republicans alike over Katrina funding.

It's a significant change in tone from the Bush years, when any perceived slight of Katrina victims was met with charges that the Republican president who bungled the initial response to the disaster continued to callously ignore the Gulf's needs years later.

Just last summer, Democrats accused Bush of putting Iraq before New Orleans when he sought to block Gulf Coast reconstruction money from a $162 billion war spending bill. Bush was pilloried for not mentioning the disaster in back-to-back State of the Union addresses.

Former Rep. Jim McCrery, R-La., who helped lead the fight for Gulf aid before retiring last year, said he was surprised over the lack of Katrina money in the bill, but figures lawmakers may be granting Obama leniency due to the magnitude of the country's current economic challenges.

"Any new president is going to have a little honeymoon," said McCrery, who is now a lobbyist. "I'd like to think that the tone would have been the same with any new president."

Thomas Langston, a Tulane University political scientist, said Democrats may be "playing nice" to keep in good favor. But dire needs remain, he said.

"Hopefully they've gotten some promises behind the scenes about longer-term commitments," Langston said. "Like most people down here, I would hate for anybody to get the impression that, 'We're good, thank you.'"

The federal government has devoted more than $175 billion to the region since Katrina ripped through New Orleans in 2005, and billions remain unspent. It's unclear how much more money will be needed, but nearly everyone agrees that the federal government should continue investing heavily in the region's levees and other infrastructure to prevent a repeat of Katrina's devastation.

Under the $787 billion stimulus bill, states will share more than $90 billion in infrastructure money. Gulf states such as Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama can use their funds for Katrina-related projects, but they'll get the same formula-based share that other states receive.

There was hardly a complaint as Obama and other Democratic leaders pieced together the package. Members of the all-Democratic Congressional Black Caucus, who have called Bush's Katrina funding a moral failure, said they were thrilled with the stimulus. Landrieu won several provisions that do not allocate new money but are aimed at cutting through red tape to free up existing funds.

"I think people looked at how generous Congress has been in the past," said Rep. Bennie Thompson, a Mississippi Democrat who chairs the House Homeland Security Committee. "(The states) have to demonstrate that they can be good custodians of the money."

Thompson and others say new funding wasn't necessary in the stimulus largely because billions of federal dollars remain bogged down in bureaucracy or tied up in planning. As a result, they said, Katrina funding doesn't fit with the quick-spending purpose of the stimulus bill, which is aimed at kick-starting the economy.

Ironically, Bush made similar arguments in recent years as Gulf advocates latched on to nearly any legislation they could find to pursue reconstruction money. For example, he routinely argued that Katrina funding didn't belong in war spending bills and that new funding wasn't urgent because unspent billions were already in the pipeline.

In part, the lack of criticism this year could reflect a stronger trust by fellow Democrats that Obama will follow through with his campaign pledge to rebuild levees and "keep the broken promises" to the Gulf.

Whether the grace period continues could hinge on how Obama addresses the issue in future spending bills.

Without discussing specific funding plans, White House spokeswoman Gannet Tseggai said Obama is "dedicated to rebuilding New Orleans and the Gulf Coast and looks forward to working with Congress to ensure they get the help they so desperately need."

Tim Geithner Is A Tax Cheat --- Tell Him So!

Civil disobedience, conservative style!

Tim Geithner, the new Dear Treasury Secretary and Dear IRS Leader, is a tax cheat.



A blogger has put up this site, taxcheatstamps.com, where they're selling self-inking stamps that will slap the words TAX CHEAT! in bold red letters on anything ---- including across Tim Geithner's signature on any greenback issued on his watch.

It's technically illegal to write on US money, but people do it all the time, as it is almost impossible to prove that a particular person defaced a particular bill.  This is a fair writeup of the issues involved.

If you're not worried about 0bama siccing the Secret Service on you, and you're already tired of these 0bama cabinet members who don't know how to pay their taxes, buy yourself a stamp. 

By the way, the tax-cheat Secretary-nominee count is up to 5 now:

1. Wanna-be Commerce Secretary Richardson, who had the decency to withdraw his nomination before it got to committee;
2. Dear Treasury Secretary Geithner, who can't figure out TaxCut;
3. HHS Secretary-Assumptive Dasshole, who had to back away;
4. "Chief Performance Officer" nominee Nancy Killifer, who also had to withdraw;
5. Labor Secretary nominee Hilda Solis' husband, Sam Sayyad, who paid 16-year-old liens February r4th, one day before his wife's Senate hearing.
   

Each one an icky Clintonite. 

These people make me want to shower ...!

Send Up Prayers For Our Aussie Friends --- President Obama, Are You Available For Prayer?

The destruction, of land, of property, of human health and human lives, in Victoria from wildfire is enormous, and still growing.

Whole towns have been "wiped off the map." The fire is apparently outrunning cars. Authorities will be searching the affected areas for days looking for casualties. Twenty-two are in Melbourne's Alfred Hospital with burns. 108 130 are known dead.

And, heaven help us, it seems to be arson.

Hey! The Great And Powerful Zero! Have you offered our Aussie comrades any assistance?

Masturbation Fantasy As Journalism

Sometimes a President Is Just a President

The other night I dreamt of Barack Obama. He was taking a shower right whenI needed to get into the bathroom to shave my legs, and then he was being yelled at by my husband, Max, for smoking in the house. It was not clear whether Max was feeling protective of the president’s health or jealous because of the cigarette.

The other day a friend of mine confided that in the weeks leading up to the election, the Obamas’ apparent joy as a couple had made her just miserable. Their marriage looked so much happier than hers. Their life seemed so perfect. “I was at a place where I was tempted daily to throttle my husband,” she said. “This coincided with Michelle saying the most beautiful things about Barack. Each time I heard her speak about him I got tears in my eyes — because I felt so far away from that kind of bliss in my own life and perhaps even more, because I was so moved by her expressions of devotion to him. And unlike previous presidential couples, they are our age, have children the same age and (just imagine the stress of daily life on the campaign) by all accounts should have been fighting even more than we were.”



As we all know, in journalism, two anecdotes are just one short of a national trend. I figured that my friend and I couldn’t possibly be the only ones dreaming, brooding or otherwise obsessing about the Obamas. Were other people, I wondered, being possessed by our new first family?

I launched an e-mail inquiry. And learned that they were. Often, in strikingly similar ways. Many women — not too surprisingly — were dreaming about sex with the president. In these dreams, the women replaced Michelle with greater or lesser guilt or, in the case of a 62-year-old woman in North Florida, whose dream was reported to me by her daughter, found a fully above-board solution: “Michelle had divorced Barack because he had become ‘too much of a star.’ He then married my mother, who was oh so proud to be the first lady,” the daughter wrote me.

There was some daydreaming too, much of it a collective fantasy about the still-hot Obama marriage. “Barack and Michelle Obama look like they have sex. They look like they like having sex,” a Los Angeles woman wrote to me, summing up the comments of many. “Often. With each other. These days when the sexless marriage is such a big celebrity in America (and when first couples are icons of rigid propriety), that’s one interesting mental drama.”

Most dreams, however, were, like mine, more prosaic.

There was a dream, sent from Minneapolis, about buying Barack the perfect sandwich, and a dream from Westport, Conn., about inviting Michelle and the girls over for lunch and a play date: “I told her I’d make tuna fish sandwiches and cupcakes, and told her that she didn’t need to worry about the kids, no need to hire a sitter or extra secret service, that I had a nice basement/playroom for them. I explained how hard it was to move to a new home, and to take her time if she needed to unpack or run to Costco or something. She asked me about other supermarkets, and I told her that Stop & Shop had a sale on tuna fish and paper towels.” And one woman in Wisconsin had frequent daydreams about having the Obamas over for a glass of wine.

One woman wrote that when she couldn’t get to sleep at night, she “lay in bed and thought about the Obama girls in their rooms at the White House. I thought about Marian Robinson up on the third floor. And about Barack and Michelle, a couple who clearly have a ‘thing’ for each other, spooning together in bed. It helped me relax.”

I understood perfectly where these cozy dreams of easy familiarity came from. It was that sense so many people share of having a very immediate connection to Barack Obama, whether they’re black or biracial, or children of single parents or self-made strivers; or they’re lawyers or community organizers or Ivy League graduates or smokers or basketball players or Blackberry users or parents or married or Democrats. A lot of people share the fantasy that having the Obamas over for “dinner and a game of Scrabble,” as one daydreamer put it to me, is something that really could just about happen.

“This is the first president I’ve known who looks, talks and acts like a peer,” is how one Washington man explained it to me. “Notwithstanding his somewhat exotic life story, I feel like I understand what he’s like and where he’s coming from. And despite his incredible achievements, he still seems like a lot of people I know. If you stopped the clock in 2004, in fact, or maybe a couple of years earlier, he’d feel roughly like a peer in terms of accomplishments, too. Of course I know nobody with his political gifts, speaking skills and confidence, and he’s also a gifted writer and thinker. But I feel like one or two different turns for Obama or me and he could have been someone my friends and I wouldn’t think it extraordinary to have in our circle.”

Sometimes this sense of close identification turns a bit dark. There’s a subcategory of people who feel that they really should have true intimacy with the Obamas. Because they went to school with them. Because they used to dream like them. Because, with one or two “different turns,” they maybe could have been them.

These are not the people made most happy by thinking about the Obamas.

“They do seem to have it all together — a great marriage, beautiful children, a modern day Norman Rockwell family,” said a divorced Harvard grad with children in a top D.C. private school. “Why them, not me?”

These are people for whom the Obamas are not just a beacon of hope, inspiration and “demigodlikeness,” as a New York lawyer put it, but also a kind of mirror. And the refracted image of self they see is not one they much admire.

“I keep thinking about how I squandered my education and youth,” the New York lawyer wrote to me. “I went off to college from high school being completely community-minded, doing a lot of volunteer work for the homeless and for hunger and tutoring poor kids. Then I got to college and forgot my ideals. Barack was my year at Columbia. Why wasn’t I hanging out with him and being serious and following my ideals instead of hanging out in clubs? Same with law school. I partied my way through instead of taking advantage of all that I could have. Both Obamas were there when I was. I feel like if I’d been a better person I would have gotten to know them.”

A Washington lawyer expressed similar sentiments: “I feel like I know Barack, that I have worked grassroots and have created change in the way that he has. I [also] have feelings of a mom who had possibility but ended up running school auctions and mediating family business matters rather than having the opportunity to be out there on a national level creating change. So when I watch Barack I feel like: I can do that … and what am I doing with my life? Even though he is way smarter and more articulate than me.”

Another Washington woman, a global health care consultant, expressed her sense of Obama-inadequacy in a dream: “I dreamed I was an Obama girl. I had a chance to be in the same room with him for the first time. There were dark velvet chairs and he was standing there with all this dark and mist around him. His lips so purple and sensuous as if to be otherworldly,” she wrote to me. “I moved gently toward him and then I said the wrong thing. Obama tamped it down like some vapor that didn’t register. He wasn’t even flattered.”

(“Like a lot of folks, I have anxiety about being outside of the Obama administration universe right now,” she then explained to me. “Even though I was at the ‘it’ ball of inauguration balls, I still felt like other balls were greener, or more purple, or with credentials completely out of my control — more young. I really feel like I’m scrambling internally … to deserve Obama cred and all I’ve got is this over-my-head wonder for the man that amounts to being an Obama girl.”)

For some, not knowing the Obamas has almost turned into a feeling of being snubbed or excluded. Like in middle school. It’s funny. Almost.

“Why won’t my kids be sleeping over at the White House? And as my daughter noted, why couldn’t she get to sit front and center and see the Jonas Brothers and Miley perform at the kids’ inaugural concert? If she went to Sidwell, then she might have these chances, she said …” wrote a mother whose kids are not at Sidwell Friends school with Sasha
and Malia.“Will Michelle stay down to earth? She could prove it by joining our book club,” wrote a Sidwell mom.

This is, perhaps, the price of faux-familiarity. If I were Barack Obama (or Michelle, for that matter), I’d be a little scared. After all, when people are wearing their egos on their sleeves, it’s so easy to bruise their feelings. What will happen if fantasy turns to contempt?

The Wrong Black Man

Today, I was at my beauty shop, getting my hair done. I took doughnuts to the beauty shop, something I rarely do, as I figured I would have to bribe my way in.

<smile>

Not really. Tuesday's been doing my hair every other week for twenty years come this September. She was the first black person I met in Austin, she was the first person to do my hair here in Austin, and in nearly twenty years my hair's been done by someone else only twice. She and I are friends, and we have been debating politics at least since she had her first shop. She's religious, she's conservative, she votes Democrat, despite my best efforts <smile>.

We're friends.

So, anyway, she had one other customer in the shop when I arrived on Inauguration Day, a woman who I had seen a time or two before, but whose name I still don't know. Tuesday said I could watch the Inauguration with them, as long as I didn't boo.

I dissed Feinswine and made Tuesday and the other lady laugh. We critiqued Michelle's dress, and I figured out why Malia always dresses too "grown" for her age.

The three of us prayed that Aretha would be completely covered up when she was announced, and we were all loving that hat! She made all three of us cry ... Lord, thank you kindly for voices like Aretha's, that lift our hearts and our spirits.

Tuesday and the other customer went into the shampoo room, while I stayed outside to let them know when the oath started. I was digging Itzhak and Yo-Yo and the others, and digging the reaction of the children to classical music --- the expressions on some of the kindergardener's faces were wondrous.

Tuesday and the other customer came back out in time to see the swearing-in. They were all agog because of his skin color --- Tuesday even said, "I'm proud of my blackness today!" (Which shocked me.) Me, I was heart-full, as I always am, at the peaceful exchange of power. It wasn't done undercover, at midnight, but in the light, at the stroke of noon; it wasn't enforced by a gun or a bayonet, but by the rule of law and custom.

The color on his skin was, of course, wonderful to see ... but, truly, it's the content of his character that matters most to me, and should to everyone.

As I told the ladies at the beauty shop, it's wonderful to see a black man take the oath ... but it's the wrong black man.

Kinfolk In The White House

Lots of excitement about Michelle Obama's mother, Mrs. Marian Robinson, moving into the White House, at least for a while, to help the girls transition.

As a non-racist conservative, I think it's a great idea.  Though I never knew my maternal grandmother, and though I did know my paternal grandmother all too well, I'm told that there is no love like grandparent's love.  I would want nothing less for two little girls who must be a bit overwhelmed at all the recent changes in their lives.

Of course, hanging out on Free Republic, I have to confront the "I'm not racist, but I sure can whip out the ugliest JPEG of Aunt Esther in existence whenever the subject comes up" crowd.  (More on that next post.)  I couldn't believe that no other President ever had kinfolk move onto the third floor of the White House, so I did a little research.

I was right.

John Tyler (10th President, 1841-1845) apparently married well; his wealthy mother in law, Julianna Gardiner, paid for the redecoration of a goodly part of the White House when she got tired of its shabbiness.


The father-in-law of Benjamin Harrison (26th President, 1889 - 1893), the Reverend Doctor John Witherspoon Scott, lived with the Harrisons in the White House until the old gentleman died in 1892.

Andrew Jackson's whole blended family --- his dead wife's brother's three kids,  his dead wife's great-nephew, and the three kids he and his wife took in when they were orphaned, his daughter-in-law (married to one of the nephew-in-laws Jackson adopted)  --- fell in on the White House when Jackson served as President from 1829-1837.

U.S. Grant's father in law, Patrick Dent, a Southern sympathizer, hung around the White House for years. 

FDR's
thirteen grandchildren were around so often that Eleanor had a playground put in on
the South Lawn.

Truman's MIL lived with her daughter and son-in-law
when he was VP (and VP Truman had a five-room apartment then, not an
official residence); she went to the White House with the rest of the
family.  from all accounts, she was hell on wheels.

Eisenhower's MIL lived at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

Tipper
Gore's mother lived in a pool house on the grounds of the Naval
Observatory when Al was VP.

Laura Bush's mother stayed at the White
House for weeks at a time around the holidays.

And now, apparently, one more in-law is about to move in.  some conservatives would have it be the ruination of the nation.  Could it be the color of this woman's skin that makes all the difference?